Joe pounded on the door, and I could feel Ralph glancing at me every few seconds.
"Sylbert Rundine! This is CCPD!" The door opened to reveal a rather tall bald guy, about the same size as Ralph. "You Sylbert Rundine?"
"Bert...Rundine. The 'E's silent." He said, correcting our pronunciation.Ralph sighed, slipping a five into Cisco's hand.
"So close." He whispered.
"I'm Detective Joe West, these are my associates. We're looking into a robbery that took place? Wanted to ask you some questions."
"Ok."
"Do you happen to own a 1970s Chevelle?" I asked.
"Well, I used to."
"Oh, my glob." Cisco said, going into the apartment and walking over to a table full of figurines. "Is that a replica of DARPA's HTV-3X?"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, don't you know not to mess with another man's toys?" Ralph asked, following him inside.
"Or to not just walk into people's homes uninvited?" I muttered to myself.
"You man Figurines." Rundine corrected.
"Yes," Cisco agreed, "Yes he does. Wow, this is a perfect replica. It even has a tiny automatic navigation control system!" I furrowed my eyebrows.
"That's weirdly...accurate." I mean, the case in question here was that an entire Meta-proof building disappeared. But what if it didn't disappear, it only shrunk?
"This is the reason I don't have any money in my savings."
"Oh, I get it." I stood by Ralph, eyeing Rundine suspiciously. Ralph put a hand on my back.
"I know that look." He whispered.
"Stay alert." I whispered back.
"Is this you?" Joe asked, pointing to a picture of a buff, intimidating-looking man with a goatee, looking very similar to the picture of 'Big Sir' we'd been shown earlier.
"Yeah, hard to believe. Fifteen years ago, I was a bit of a gym rat." Fifteen years ago, he looked exactly like Big Sir, and has a record? Joe and I made eye contact. "Well gentlemen, lady, I was just about to head out so if you guys are good here..." We started slowly towards the door as Rundine grabbed his coat.
"Yeah, I just have one more question for you." I said. "Did you spend any time around Mercury Labs fifteen years ago?" He turned around, shooting a yellow beam of light at the table, revealing a gun. He shot at Joe first, who ducked. Ralph wrapped his arms around me, crouching down so that he was shielding my head with his hands. I stood up just in time to see the dude parachute out the window. "What the heck?!" I followed him, jumping out the window myself. I was right behind him when he whirled around, shooting the beam at me. It hit me before I could move and all of a sudden, the giant buildings of Central City were twenty times bigger.
"What the heck?!" I shouted. A breach opened, and the guys appeared. Rundine was gone, and I didn't see where he went.
"Dang. He wasn't that quick, was he?"
"And where is Laura?" Ralph asked.
"You guys check down there, I'll check the streets."
"Guys?" I called. But no one could here me. "Guys!" I kicked off of the ground, flying towards them. I was just about to Ralph when Joe shouted:
"Guys, he's here!" The car shrank down, and then I saw Cisco and Ralph enveloped in the same yellow light that I was in earlier.
"Oh, that feels weird." Cisco said. "Joe, he's getting away!" They shrank and I landed beside a now tiny Cisco and Ralph.
"Seems we've got bigger problems." Ralph looked at me.
"Laura! There you are!"
"Why didn't you warn us?!" Cisco asked.
"I tried! You couldn't hear me! I was right behind you the whole time!" I argued.
~~~
"This is-"
"Ridiculous."
"You ok, guys?" Joe, Harry, and Caitlin were looking down at us as the three of us were currently standing on the table. Ralph and I were leaned against a mug, facing each other, and Cisco was facing the others.
"Are we doing ok?" Cisco asked. "Are we doing ok, does it look like we're doing ok? We're two inches tall, Caitlin!"
"Yeah, I'm like, Laura sized now." He looked down at me. "Is this how you always see the world?" Cisco leaned over me.
"Oh, that's really funny man, I guess your body just finally shrunk down to a size that's proportional to your brain!" Cisco shouted at him.
"That was directed at me, why does that warrant a response from you?" I asked.
"Ralph, have you tried just stretching back to normal size?" Caitlin questioned. He started stretching, only to snap back into place.
"Ah! Oh, my back! Jeez Louise!"
"Ok, you know what? Maybe I can breach us out of here." Cisco opened a breach, jumping through it, only to come out right beside the mug, hitting his head on it.
"Really thought, uh...I was gonna go farther than that."
"How many fingers am I holding up?" Ralph asked, holding up two fingers.
"Four fingers."
"You're no less annoying at that size."
"Hey guys, I think I got something." Iris said, running into the room. They all went into the main part of the Cortex. I kicked off, flying after them. I couldn't help but feel like a bug. "So, I wasn't able to pin Ray Palmer or the Wave Rider, but I was able to reach Felicity. So, Ray uses dwarf star alloy to power the shrinking capabilities in the A.T.O.M. suit. But, on October 10th, Palmer Tech's last depository of alloy was stolen from Central City's facility."
"Which, happens to be the same day that Barry came out of the Speed Force," I said, as loudly as I could. Everyone looked down at me. "How much do you want to bet that he jumped on the bus after that heist?"
"So, Dwarf Star Alloy plus dark matter equals Rundine's shrinking powers?"
"Not exactly. Nature doesn't work to scale. If the human body were to shrink, we can't lift our skeleton." Caitlin answered.
"So Rundine's power must be able to shrink the space between atomic bonds." Harry theorized.
"Miniaturize Tech so you can steal it and then make it big so you can sell it."
"Kind of genius." I muttered to myself.
"Hey." I looked over from my seat on top of the computer screen to see Cecile.
"Hey."
"Ratchet's trial records." She handed Iris a file.
"Oh."
"You really think the guy who shrunk that building is the same guy we need to free Barry's friend?"
"Well, I mean look." Iris pulled up their pictures on the screen. "Be easy to mistake them, right? I mean they certainly had a resemblance."
"Rundine hit up a warehouse a month after they picked up Big Sir." Joe pointed out.
"Still, that's a big coincidence." Cecile pointed out.
"It keeps being said: There are no coincidences when it comes to DeVoe, and that includes Barry's cellmate."
"Well, I can't sell that to a judge, so if we wanna get Big Sir out, we are gonna need a confession from Dr. Shrinker."
"Dwarfstar!" Cisco shouted, breaching onto the computer next to me. He was panting. Cecile screamed.
"What the heck is that?!' She then saw me, and I offered her a two-fingered salute.
"That's what I'm naming him, Dwarfstar. Oh gosh. Oh, it takes a long time to breach here." Iris walked over, pausing as there was a squish under her foot.
"Who spit gum on the floor?!" She asked. I cringed.
"Not gum. That would be my boyfriend." I said, flying over to her. She held up her foot, and Ralph was flat against the sole of it, his arms and legs all stretched out.
"I'm a gum-shoe! Not gum on a shoe!" He shouted.
"Oh my gosh, get him off, get him off." I flew over, putting my arms under his arms and peeling him off of the shoe. He returned to normal shape and was too heavy for me, so I began to fall towards the floor. Caitlin reached out and caught us in her hand.
"Thank you. At this size, that fall could have killed me." I told her.
"You guys are going in the Hamster cage."
"Ugh. Hamster cage," Cisco repeated.